Mr Blue Sky
by Ellynne
Summary: Besides the basic problems of being trapped in a forest with no way out where it rains all the time and you can't start a fire, Hansel and Gretel are about to meet a wood sprite from another Galaxy and a demon who wants the Dark One to explain what humans are doing in her home.
1. It's a Beautiful New Day

Gretel was cold and damp. She also couldn't get a fire started. Normally, fired were easy. Pile some dry twigs over a little tinder, strike the flint with her belt knife, and get warm and cozy. Also, cook a meal and have enough light to see what you were eating.

Normally. _Normally, _Gretel had a pile of dry tinder and dry wood. Gretel's father was a woodcutter. _Normally_, even if food was short, there was plenty of firewood at their cottage, just waiting to be put on the hearth. _Normally,_ even if there wasn't, Gretel knew some tricks that get damp wood burning. _Normally, _Gretel wasn't trapped outside where it had been raining for three days.

Gretel and her brother Hansel had made a small lean-to out of fallen branches and leaves (Gretel was a bit worried about the lean-to. She didn't know whose lands these were, but some lords could get difficult about what people did on their lands. She hadn't used anything besides fallen branches and a few ferns, which should be allowed. But, looking for their missing father should be allowed, too, and look how the Queen had reacted to _that_)_._ She'd tried to get some wood to dry out in there, but all it did was get moldy. Two of the pine branches had even put out buds.

Water seeped through the lean-to's cover and dripped onto her head. It wasn't fair.

But, they needed a fire. It was cold and miserable, and the only food they'd found were roots so tough and bitter her teeth ached from trying to eat them. Hansel made snares (another thing that could get them hung if these weren't wild lands. The list kept getting longer and longer), but hadn't caught anything in them.

If they were hung, Gretel wondered if they'd be given a meal first. It almost seemed worth it.

She was still striking sparks from her flint when Hansel came back. He'd gone to check his snares again. If he'd caught something, Gretel decided she could eat it cold and raw if she had to. To her surprise, he was carrying three fish—great, big, _fat _ones.

"How did you get those?" she asked. They didn't have any hooks or tackle; and Hansel's attempts to catch them by hand, the way their father did, usually had him falling into the water. Gretel had seen one of the fish, a salmon, pop its head out of the water and do something that looked suspiciously as if it were laughing at him.

On the other hand, she really didn't care how he got it. They were fish. They were _food._

"I had help." Hansel nodded towards a small figure walking along beside him.

Gretel hadn't noticed it before. It was only eight or so inches tall and looked like it might have been carved from old wood. She thought it might be some kind of forest sprite. The sprite was carrying a small bundle of very small slivers of wood. It looked up at her with large, dark eyes set in a face as innocent and round as a baby's.

"I am Groot," the sprite said.

X

The little sprite put down its wood by Gretel's failed attempt to make a fire and examined her tinder. It looked at it in digust before tossing the damp mess aside. "I am Groot," it said confidently as it made a smaller pyramid within Gretel's larger one with his twigs. Then, it took the sticks from the larger pyramid and began moving them around.

"I am Groot," it told Gretel, pointing at the smaller pile. Gretel just stared at it.

The sprite puffed its cheeks and glared at her. "I am Groot!" it said, jabbing its finger at the pile.

"I think he wants you to try lighting them," Hansel said.

He? The walking stick was a he? Well, the sprite didn't argue with Hansel, so it probably was. If sticks cared about being called he or she.

Whatever it was, it was magical and, since the last two magical people Gretel had met had tried to eat her and transported her to a half-drowned forest, Gretel decided not to make it—or him—angry. She hastily struck her flint again. Instead of going out (which was what she expected, magic twig or not), a couple sparks fell on the smaller pyramid of twigs, and they instantly blazed up, lighting all the wood. The new fire burned merrily, with none of the smoke or reluctant smoldering damp wood usually had.

"How. . . ?"

"I am Groot," the sprite said with a smug smile.

Gretel turned to her brother. "How'd you find him?"

"I saw some footprints and followed them," Hansel said. He sat down beside her under the lean-to and got out his knife, picking up a stick to whittle into something they could cook a fish on.

Gretel picked up another stick and began doing the same. "They must have been tiny," she said. "How'd you see them?"

"What? Oh, no, these were human footprints."

"Human? There's someone out there?" Could it be their father? Only, she wasn't sure their father was in this forest. The compass hadn't led them to him so far. But, it was a person, someone who could help them.

Or maybe not. The queen was human. The witch who'd tried to eat them had been human, too (probably). Besides (she looked guiltily at the lean-to that might or might not get them hung), people wouldn't have to be witches to get them in trouble.

"It's not Father," Hansel said. "The feet were too small. And barefoot."

Barefoot in this rain? That wasn't good. Maybe someone else the queen had been mad at? "We should find them. The footprints had to be fresh if the rain hasn't washed them away."

"I tried. The only one I found was Groot."

Gretel looked at Groot. "Do you know where they are?"

Groot gave her a severe look. "I am Groot," he said firmly. It sounded like a warning.

"But, they'll be cold. They don't even have shoes!"

Groot rolled his eyes. "I am Groot." Clearly, shoes didn't matter to him.

"You may not need shoes, but people do."

Groot nodded solemnly. "I am _Groot._"

His tone sounded like he was saying, _Yes, exactly._ Gretel tried to figure it out while the sprite pulled three roasting stakes out from under a bush and began fixing the fish onto them.

_Yes, exactly._

"You're saying whoever made the footprints isn't . . . human?"

"I am Groot," the sprite said cheerfully, handing her a fish to hold over the fire, glad that she'd finally got it. He handed Hansel another one.

"Is it something . . . dangerous?"

The sprite hesitated. "I am . . . Groot?"

Did that mean _Maybe?_

The sprite saw her fear and laughed. "I am Groot!" he said.

Gretel supposed that meant _Don't worry, nothing's going to happen,_ from the way the sprite turned his attention to trying to heft his fish-on-a-stick over the fire. It looked awkward, and Gretel was half-afraid he might fall in.

"And _I_," a cold, accusing voice spoke up from behind them, "Am the demon Curupira. What are you doing in my forest?"

The sprite shrieked in terror, not even saying anything about being Groot. The fish fell into the fire. Gretel and Hansel peered out of the lean-to as the creature walked around it to confront them.


	2. Hey, You, With the Pretty Face

Iara was _so_ pathetic, Curupira thought. She was perched high in a tree watching as the other demon (oh, wait, they called her a _siren_ now. _Demon _wasn't good enough for her) seduced a human (_ick_) and dragged him to his watery death (_again_).

It was worse than pathetic. It was _boring._

It wasn't like the humans cared about Iara. The only reason they came here was because she'd plopped herself down in the middle of a magic lake with healing waters. It was the water they wanted, not _her_. Not that you'd ever get Iara to see that. That demon (sorry, _siren_) thought she was the center of the universe.

So, the humans came, Iara rose up in her sparkly dress with an even sparklier tiara (Iara always had to be wearing whatever the humans thought was pretty this eon. Only sparklier. A few centuries ago, when even humans still said weaving was just a fad, it had been skin tight pants made of fish scales . Now, it was princess dresses. Because, in Iara's mind, that was what a relationship was all about, wasn't it? Oh, well. At least, the tiara kept the hair out of her eyes now Iara had grown it out. And gone ). Iara's mist rose from the water, the humans breathed it in, and became really, really stupid.

Not that humans weren't stupid to start with but (as Curupira grudgingly admitted) anything that could kill as many tigers as they did couldn't be a _complete _idiot. It didn't matter how many times they'd been warned about Iara, they always fell for it. Even if they managed to hold out against the beautiful-maiden-in-sparklies, all the fight went out of them as soon as Iara did that thing where she looked like whoever they were most in love with. Or lust with. Whatever. Whoever stopped what little brains they had from working.

They ran into Iara's arms. Iara did a bit of snogging and dragged them into the water to drown. That was Iara for you. Twenty minutes was the longest she ever lasted in a relationship.

Pathetic.

And stupid. Curupira didn't care much for humans, but there had been a tribe ages ago she gave her protection to so long as they guarded her forests. Now and then, she'd even share some magic with one, if the human could survive the ritual involved (well, _survived _wasn't the right word. But, if it went right, they weren't _that _dead at the end of it). One of them had fallen into Iara's trap. Curupira (against her better judgment) had dragged him. But, she'd been trapped at the bottom of Iara's lake, tied up with snakes in his place, because of it.

She'd gotten out, of course. As soon as Iara's attention wandered (meaning, the next time a human came near the water), Curupira told the snakes their mistress wasn't the only one who could make pretty clothes out of their skin, and she might be making herself a new outfit, something that went better with living at a lake bottom, if they didn't get away from her _right now_.

Curupira had waited for Iara to come after her. She'd had it all planned out, starting with Iara's panic when she realized Curupira hadn't been a prisoner for more than five minutes and was just playing with her, ending with the big fight where Curupira stuffed what was left of the demon and all her sparkles down a deep hole. Or a cooking pot. Or down a volcano (Iara _hated _heat). She hadn't made up her mind yet.

But, Iara never noticed. At first, Curupira had kept a close watch, waiting for the moment to spring on her. Time passed, and Iara got more and more _boring_. She used to have hobbies. They were boring hobbies, like turning men into pigs or starting death matches between crocodiles. But, they were something. Now, all she did was make sparkly dresses and drown people. _Boring._

Her power had shrunk as well. Once, there hadn't been any body of water where she couldn't make her magic felt. Now, Curupira didn't think she'd left her little puddle since people started using metal.

All right, life wasn't as easy as it used to be. Humans kept learning new and different ways to be greedy, annoying, blood-thirsty idiots. Steel axes caused her a world of grief. She supposed fishing spears and nets had done the same for Iara. But, they were _demons_, and humans were as easy to kill as they'd always been. True, there were more of them than there used to be and they did get underfoot, but that's why Curupira had made a bargain with the Dark One. Now, the Infinite Forest was protected. Nothing could get in or out of it without magic. Her creatures were protected here (except from each other. But, that was what forests were _for_—and she kept them from being too hungry for each other).

Curupira had had all she could take of Iara for today. It was time to go home and check on things there.

A twitch of magic, and she was there. It was raining again. Curupira smiled. She liked the slick, cold feel of it against her skin. It was nothing like the dark, still waters of Iara's pond, all carpeted with bones (Curupirs slept on tree branches or stones, but _bones?_ Bones had all those pointy edges. How did you sleep on that?). Rain twirled down from the skies, full of the scent of clouds and air. When Curupira caught a raindrop on her fingertip and placed it on her tongue, she could savor the taste of trees it had passed by, the sharp sting of pine, the soft sweetness of maple, the bitter dark of oak.

Or, if she let them pass by her, they would shatter against earth and moss, seeping into the ground, or dancing in rippling puddles. Some of her beasts would be hunkering down in caves and burrows. Others, would be called out of their hidden places to see the world before they were driven away again by light and sky. She looked in on them, seeing that they were well.

But, something wasn't quite right. Curupira scented the air. She didn't smell fear or death. No new sickness had crept into the forest. Yet, something had changed.

She recognized it when she saw the holes dug for roots that had been cut with a sharp blade and leaves that had been sliced with a knife. Hunting in the shadows, she found snares meant to catch her animals.

Humans. There were humans in her forest.


	3. Where Did We Go Wrong?

Gretel 's first impression was of green—green vines and leaves and burning eyes glaring down at her from a great height. Scrambling to her feet, she realized the creature was only a little taller than her and human looking, more or less. Her clothes, if that's what you could call them, seemed to have grown on her and maybe they had. They were the same, dark green as her neck and chest, what Gretel could see of it. They were skin tight and had the same, sleek smoothness as leaves or grass. Vines grew around her arms and legs. One snaked up around her body. Only her face and hands were human colored.

And her feet, Gretel saw with a quick glance down. They were all the same white-pink. But her feet stretched behind her instead of in front.

Hansel had followed the footsteps, but they hadn't led anywhere. Because he would have been following them back to wherever she'd been, not getting closer.

The creature's face might have been pretty if she hadn't been so furious—and if Gretel hadn't been so sure she was even more dangerous than the evil queen or the blind witch. She looked almost like a flower, a pale circle bursting from the deep green. Even her ears were green. But, her hair was a sunlight yellow, little knobs along her brow like small buds about to flower. The rest was caught up in a short braid at the top of her head, ending in a loose burst like a giant dandelion puff. Her eyes weren't green, Gretel realized with surprise. She had been certain when she first saw them they were. It had been like looking into a forest and feeling its rage. Now, standing face to face, she saw they were ice blue, cold as death and burning with murderous fury, worse than anything she'd felt from the queen.

X

The humans stared stupidly at Curupira, not even bothering to answer her question in the second or two she gave them to try, so she lunged for their throats. Maybe they'd be a little more talkative with her claws wrapped round their necks. But, a small stick-figure jumped in her way.

"I am Groot."

"What does it look like I'm doing?" she snapped, making another lunge. The sprite leaped back in her way, waving his small arms.

"_I _am _Groot._"

"I don't care. They shouldn't be here!"

He shot out vines to block her. "I am _Groot._"

"What does that have to do with anything? It's my forest!"

"_I _am Groot!"

"Of course, it's your home, too. That's why I protect it. It's for the ones who have a right to be here." She tried to get past on the other side. More vines appeared, stopping her. Unless she wanted to rip off his arms. Tempting. They grew back, after all. But, she wasn't that angry. Yet.

Meanwhile, despite the vines growing from him, Groot managed to wave behind him, taking in the whole forest. "I am Groot."

"No, it's _not_ the same. They have a home of their own, and it isn't here."

"I am Groot?"

Curupira glared at the humans. "Well?"

They looked frightened. Or guilty. Definitely guilty. But, Curupira realized for the first time, they were young. Still children. Not that humans didn't stay young and stupid for ages longer than any other creature (forever, if you counted the adults). But (she admitted grudgingly), it meant they couldn't help being young and stupid. At this age, it was how they were _supposed_ to be.

"Well what?" the boy asked.

Curupira rolled her eyes. Yes, they were stupid, all right. "_This _is what you want to protect?"

Groot shrugged. "I am Groot."

"They can't help being idiots, either."

"I am Groot." He tapped his foot impatiently.

"Oh, fine. I'll tell them." She glared at the two of them. "He said maybe you don't have a home. Is he right?"

The boy and girl looked pale and ready to cry, the last thing Curupira needed. "Maybe?" the girl said.

Curupira grit her teeth. If she wanted vapid answers that went nowhere, she'd go chat with Iara. "'Maybe' isn't an answer."

"We had a home," the girl said. "We lived with our father. I—I think the evil queen took him. She's the one who sent us here."

"Evil queen? You mean Zad? No, wait, he's dead. Still dead. And he was a male. I'm pretty sure. Queens are what humans call it when a female makes the rules, aren't they?"

"Y-yes ma'am," the girl said.

_Ma'am._ It was a human word, but Curupira was fairly sure it was respectful. "Why did she take your father? Did he break one of her rules?"

"No, ma'am!" the girl said, but her conviction gave way to uncertainty. "I don't think so. Papa's a woodcutter." She looked nervously at Groot.

He waved this off. "I am Groot."

"He says he understands," Curupira said.

"He does?" the boy blurted out.

"He helped you build the fire, didn't he? He'd stop you from chopping down the forest, but he has more in common with you than he does with a few twigs. Less than you have in common with those fish."

The boy looked queasily at the fish still cooking by the fire. "We do?"

"Eyes, mouths, skin, backbones, and the intelligent look on your faces. Is that what your father tried to do? Chop down this queen's forest?" Not that humans usually lived in forests. Most of them preferred those clusters of dung heaps to live in. Villages, they called them.

"Papa obeyed the law!" the girl said indignantly. This was followed by a passionate speech about whatever laws humans had for their woodcutters. Her papa had places he was allowed to cut and places he wasn't and there were rules about what he could take and how much and these were ancient traditions and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Curupira cut her off before they all died of boredom. "Your papa did something to make this queen angry. If it wasn't chopping down trees, what was it?"

"We were looking for Papa when the queen found us," the girl told her. "She said she'd help us find him if we did something for her."

"Kill my animals? Burn down my forest?"

The last wasn't really fair. From the look on her face—and the way she looked at the sopping wet trees all around them—the girl knew this as well as Curupira did. The Dark One himself would have his work cut out for him, burning down her forest on a day like today (not that he couldn't do it if he tried hard enough). But, the girl was the trespasser, and no one ever said Curupira had to be fair, anyway.

"She wanted us to rob a witch," the girl said.

A witch? Curupira was the only power in this forest. Did she mean her? Did the girl think _she _was a witch? A measly, weak, _human _witch? Curupira flexed her claws, tempted to grab the girl and suck the life right out of her. But, no. The human went on to explain what had happened to them, how they had broken into a witch's cottage, been caught (the girl shot the boy a look; the boy looked guilty), and how they had almost been—

"I am _Groot?_" Groot gasped.

Curupira agreed. But, maybe she'd misunderstood them? "Aren't witches human?"

The girl grimaced. "Yes." Well, at least, she admitted it when one of her species was awful.

"There might be Troll witches," the boy said. "Or Fairy witches. Or Ogre or Dwarve witches."

"Dwarves are all boys," the girl said.

"That doesn't make sense. Where do baby Dwarves come from?"

"I don't know, but Papa says they're all boy Dwarves in the mines and Papa would know."

"Maybe girl Dwarves don't work in the mines. Or maybe they call them something else. Maybe there are _Dwarfette _witches."

Curupira, remembered why it was a waste of time to explain things to humans, didn't bother telling him how many, many things were wrong with that. She stuck to the issue at hand. "But, the witch you tried to rob was human?"

"I thought she was. She looked human," the girl said.

"And she was going to _eat _you? You couldn't be mistaken?"

"She was firing up the oven."

"She was trying to decide if she wanted to cook us with butter or gravy." The boy shuddered at the memory.

"You're sure she meant it? She wasn't just trying to frighten you?"

"She had a big pile of bones in her house," the girl said. "Human ones. Child sized."

"And the queen who sent you there, did she know the witch was going to eat you?"

"The queen said we weren't the first ones she sent in," the boy said.

The girl nodded. "And she knew the others didn't come out."

"I am Groot."

"Yes, it's disgusting. But, here they are, uneaten. How'd that happen?"

"We locked her in the oven," the girl admitted.

"And ate her?"

"Of course not!"

"No 'of course' about it. You left her in an oven, didn't you?"

The children gave a slightly garbled account of how that happened. Curupira, who knew the stench of fear, could smell the memory of it on them as they told their story. It came down to desperation, luck, and a bit of skill. But, mostly luck. And shoving the witch into her own oven.

"I am Groot?"

"Oh, that's obvious enough. She couldn't, could she? The price for her magic, I bet."

"She couldn't what?" the girl asked.

"Get out of her oven. Once she was locked in, she needed someone else to let her out, probably the same one who put her in in the first place. That's why she didn't just magic the door open. And why she never left her cottage. Someone must have locker her in there, too." Curupira wondered if the imp was behind it. He'd never liked child-eating monsters. Pity the witch had found a way to bring children to her.

Groot looked worried. "I am Groot?"

"Yes, I'm certain. If she could come here, she already would have." She glared at the interlopers. "It's not like their trail is hard to follow. But, that still doesn't explain what they're doing in _my _forest."

"The queen sent us," the girl said. "She said she'd help us find our father if we helped her, but she didn't. She sent us here instead."

"Sent you how? Dragged you in a wagon and threw you out with the trash?" Curupira sneered, knowing it was impossible—or it was supposed to be.

"She did magic," the boy said.

Another nod from the girl. "She threw something at us. It was like being outside in a thunderstorm. Wind was blowing all around us and we couldn't see. Then, we woke up here."

"Magic," Curupira growled. "_Magic._"

Groot stepped back from her. "Uh . . . I am Groot?"

"Oh, I'm reasonable. I'm _perfectly _reasonable. Rumplestiltskin? Rumplestiltskin! I know you can hear me! Get over here right now, _Rumplestiltskin!_"

Groot ducked behind the girl as a high-pitched titter rang through the little clearing. "Now, now, dearie, if you yell at people like that—" the scaled, extravagantly dressed figure of the imp stepped from around a tree. The rain stopped. Water didn't even drip off the trees, not getting his silk shirt or leather pants damp. The wet, muddy ground suddenly hard enough his high, laced boots weren't didn't get any dirt on them, "-they may think you aren't happy to see them." The imp's smile was a manic as ever, but a hard light appeared in his eyes. "You wouldn't want me to think that, would you? Dearie?" There was the faintest hint of warning in his voice.

Good. He knew Curupira was angry with him. She had a _right _to be angry with him. "Maybe we aren't. One of your humans is throwing her rubbish in _my_ forest. How do you explain that? We had a _deal._"


End file.
